I did have just over 300 about 15 years ago and sold them to a chap from Bury. Since then I have somehow managed to get upto about 130. Mainly sport,some military and the odd naval card. Which is your most prized Baines card in your collection ?

I have about 60 cards of cricket rugby and football with an individual named player on. The others consist of generic cards military and naval with named personalities such as Bugler Dunne and sports including 8 generic golf and 1 named. I will try and get some scanned to you when I get some spare time.

My previous collection which I regret selling included several New York baseball cards which unfortunately we're generic but nevertheless I have never seen any others apart from the ones I had. Also were 12 cards of my own football team which took years to put together.

On the other hand the chap they went to was a very happy collector when he acquired them....

Never collected them but certainly can see the attraction, is there any information as to what series and how many they produced, my Murrays catalogue of 2008 seems not to included them.

when they were produced, nothing was documented about them , no lists, etc and definitely no sets involved.thats the great thing about them, odd cards appear that have never been seen before.bought a large collection about 18 months ago and i had never seen 95% of themi would say at least 5000+ different cards , but we will never find out the true numberniche collecting area / hope it stays that way!

Very odd...I bought one of these only last night!I have finally been convinced that this card - WELL PLAYED SCARLET RUNNERS - simply MUST be a reference to my football club, Huddersfield Town.They went by that nickname during their first season, 1908-09, although this card probably dates from c1918-early 1920s.

Designed almost certainly to celebrate Town's 1922 FA Cup win, the card shows the old Cup and date, however - this item never actually went into production, making it exceedingly RARE!!In fact Baines ceased trading soon after this date, which probably explains why it never made the print run.As you will all be aware, there are certainly other examples of Baines cards of circular design and the 'Well Played' logo is most certainly a regular feature of their cards.

I've got about two dozen of these in the Cricket Ball shape plus a handful of others with shield shapes including the best of the lot - a Rugby one highlighting "Australia" with what is purported to be an image of one of the fathers of Rugby in Australia - the immortal cricketer Victor Trumper.

I've never been able to confirm if it is him depicted but there is a definite likeness and given his standing in the cricket world in the 1890's/1900's as well as the origins of competition Rugby in Australia at the time it seems quite plausible

I did have just over 300 about 15 years ago and sold them to a chap from Bury. Since then I have somehow managed to get upto about 130. Mainly sport,some military and the odd naval card. Which is your most prized Baines card in your collection ?

😲 Sadly it wasn?t me!Interestingly, I?ve never come across any other cigarette/trade card collectors from Bury in all these years.

Why is it that nobody as yet has taken up the mantle to research these cards or at least list them, where was the company based, the period of issue and the subject matter. Are all the cards sport related or do other topics exist.

Do we know when the company was formed and what were the likely first cards/shields issued am intrigued.

I think there is quite a bit online about Baines but in terms of listing them all I am surprised more hasn't been done tbh. LDC Auctions have a great page of images of examples and I think there's a huge collection at a museum in Bradford actually. I did meet a chap in Pudsey that was an expert on Baines and Sharpe's but I can't remember his name! I'll ask at the Yorkshire branch this Sunday and see if I can track him down. I was fortunate at the back end of last year to get a Sharpe's shield showing 'Play up America' with a native American buffalo hunt scene on it. It's one of my most prized cards! (I'll do a scan this weekend)

I started a blog display Baines cards and those of his contemporaries, as cards were issued by many, many printers and firms. The list of issuers I have currently stand at 149 and I have scans of around 2,000 cards but I haven't done much research as most of my spare time these days is taken up with my Football Cartophilic Info Exchange blog.

I started a blog display Baines cards and those of his contemporaries, as cards were issued by many, many printers and firms. The list of issuers I have currently stand at 149 and I have scans of around 2,000 cards but I haven't done much research as most of my spare time these days is taken up with my Football Cartophilic Info Exchange blog.

I started a blog display Baines cards and those of his contemporaries, as cards were issued by many, many printers and firms. The list of issuers I have currently stand at 149 and I have scans of around 2,000 cards but I haven't done much research as most of my spare time these days is taken up with my Football Cartophilic Info Exchange blog.

I think there is quite a bit online about Baines but in terms of listing them all I am surprised more hasn't been done tbh. LDC Auctions have a great page of images of examples and I think there's a huge collection at a museum in Bradford actually. I did meet a chap in Pudsey that was an expert on Baines and Sharpe's but I can't remember his name! I'll ask at the Yorkshire branch this Sunday and see if I can track him down. I was fortunate at the back end of last year to get a Sharpe's shield showing 'Play up America' with a native American buffalo hunt scene on it. It's one of my most prized cards! (I'll do a scan this weekend)

Met a nice chap called Bill Duerden from Burnley at Timperley once, who was a Baines expert, but that?s a goodly while ago.

I think there is quite a bit online about Baines but in terms of listing them all I am surprised more hasn't been done tbh. LDC Auctions have a great page of images of examples and I think there's a huge collection at a museum in Bradford actually. I did meet a chap in Pudsey that was an expert on Baines and Sharpe's but I can't remember his name! I'll ask at the Yorkshire branch this Sunday and see if I can track him down. I was fortunate at the back end of last year to get a Sharpe's shield showing 'Play up America' with a native American buffalo hunt scene on it. It's one of my most prized cards! (I'll do a scan this weekend)

Met a nice chap called Bill Duerden from Burnley at Timperley once, who was a Baines expert, but that?s a goodly while ago.

I know the chap who ran the Timperley club until just recently, John Drew.Big HTAFC fan and collector.

I can see that Baines is from Bradford, from the reverse of some of the scanned cards, what was he promoting, were these free with a product or were they purchased at sporting events or even given out promoting his business.

It has been said already, there aren?t any definitive lists of what was produced. There could be 6000 different cards issued, 7000 even, nobody really knows. No one kept records like they did for cigarette cards.

I have two Brentford J Baines cards (with two players named A.S. Ling and A. Bartlett) and seen three others (G. Reid, ?Hands? and a cricket ball). One of the cards that I have, and purchased recently, hadn?t been seen before. How many more are out there or printed? We haven?t a clue!

As a one club collector, you just have to keep your eyes peeled on auction sites.....

Their values range enormously too. Some can be ?5/?10 while others could command ?150/?200. It all depends on the subject.

I did have just over 300 about 15 years ago and sold them to a chap from Bury. Since then I have somehow managed to get upto about 130. Mainly sport,some military and the odd naval card. Which is your most prized Baines card in your collection ?

😲 Sadly it wasn?t me!Interestingly, I?ve never come across any other cigarette/trade card collectors from Bury in all these years.

Just taking a skip through my Baines I have a Bury Baines card with a chap called Ross on it. Looks a nice card. Maybe we should create a post for " your favourite Baines Card in your collection". The only rule being you have to currently own it

I did have just over 300 about 15 years ago and sold them to a chap from Bury. Since then I have somehow managed to get upto about 130. Mainly sport,some military and the odd naval card. Which is your most prized Baines card in your collection ?

😲 Sadly it wasn?t me!Interestingly, I?ve never come across any other cigarette/trade card collectors from Bury in all these years.

Just taking a skip through my Baines I have a Bury Baines card with a chap called Ross on it. Looks a nice card. Maybe we should create a post for " your favourite Baines Card in your collection". The only rule being you have to currently own it

Any chance of a pic?

BTW - this is my favourite ?Baines style? card, but it was issued by Sharpes and is 3 3/4? in diameter (or 12cm for any young folk). Incidentally, amongst the players is George Ross, who captained our record 6-0 cup winning side of 1903.

I did have just over 300 about 15 years ago and sold them to a chap from Bury. Since then I have somehow managed to get upto about 130. Mainly sport,some military and the odd naval card. Which is your most prized Baines card in your collection ?

😲 Sadly it wasn?t me!Interestingly, I?ve never come across any other cigarette/trade card collectors from Bury in all these years.

Just taking a skip through my Baines I have a Bury Baines card with a chap called Ross on it. Looks a nice card. Maybe we should create a post for " your favourite Baines Card in your collection". The only rule being you have to currently own it

Any chance of a pic?

BTW - this is my favourite ?Baines style? card, but it was issued by Sharpes and is 3 3/4? in diameter (or 12cm for any young folk). Incidentally, amongst the players is George Ross, who captained our record 6-0 cup winning side of 1903.

I will scan the card as soon as I can. I am really impressed by the Sharpes team issue...not many of those around I shouldn't wonder. I wonder what the print run was on these types of issues. Anyway what is clear, not many survived..

BTW - this is my favourite ?Baines style? card, but it was issued by Sharpes and is 3 3/4? in diameter (or 12cm for any young folk). Incidentally, amongst the players is George Ross, who captained our record 6-0 cup winning side of 1903.

A lovely card, do you have any idea of the date going by the players featured on it? I've always thought of W.N. Sharpe cards as being issued in 1880's and 1890's.

When I acquired the card many years ago, it had 1891 pencilled on the back. It certainly precedes our entry to the football league in 1894/95, when we immediately won the second division. I would actually go for the 1892/93 season, as J. Clegg only joined us in 1892. All the featured players were with us for the 1892/93 season and as we?d won the, then prestigious, Lancashire Cup the previous season, it was likely that we featured on such a card in recognition of that.

When I acquired the card many years ago, it had 1891 pencilled on the back. It certainly precedes our entry to the football league in 1894/95, when we immediately won the second division. I would actually go for the 1892/93 season, as J. Clegg only joined us in 1892. All the featured players were with us for the 1892/93 season and as we?d won the, then prestigious, Lancashire Cup the previous season, it was likely that we featured on such a card in recognition of that.

Nice bit of detective work, it's great to be able to date some of these rare cards. As you know very few are dated, sometimes it's possible to see a date on a players international/county/club cap. Some early Sharpe's cards were created for specific Yorkshire Cup rugby matches, but there'a almost no information on these games anywhere on the internet.